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I misread the title as "Woman frozen ..." and mentally prepared myself for some existentially shattering shit.


All: please don't do threads like this here.


Indeed, if such a woman had been unfrozen, would she be too important of a scientific discovery to ever be allowed to live a normal human life again? Would she just be a research subject quarantined and experimented on for the rest of her days?


She would definitely have to be quarantined, for both her sake and ours. Neither party is likely to be sufficiently immunized against the diseases of the other's time.


What does it mean for a reanimated woman from 42000 years ago to live a "normal" life in modern times?


Many have wondered the same. I personally think Brandon Frasier's perspective in the film, "Encino Man," was quite apt.


The late Phil Hartman’s exploration as Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer was also trenchant and emotionally gripping


I doubt she would be able to learn to communicate at all, assuming this hypothetical frozen woman was and adult.


Of course she would be able to communicate. Cats and dogs can communicate to us.


Ok, communicate using complex language. She's not going to be picking up English at even a basic level.


Humans were speaking by 42,000 years ago. And even if not, she would have all the physiological equipment, unlike Koko.


Because she's a worm.


Why not? She probably already speaks more than one language, and they're probably both more complex than English. Many people learn languages quite unlike their native language late into their adulthood, but she's probably fairly young.


Why can’t she? A child comes into this world with nothing and learns to speak in time.


You can also watch Torchwood episode on this topic. It was beautiful.


Particularly a pre-Homo Sapiens Sapiens human...


42,000 years ago would be essentially equivalent to a modern human, physiologically.


All kinds of new fun diseases, probably.


Pretty sure the only viable career option for her would be Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer.


Experimented on? Seriously? The modern world does not operate according to Dr. Mengele's ethics. Anyone "experimenting on" her would receive worldwide condemnation and all sorts of criminal charges.

(Why, other than personal animus, would this be downvoted?)


Because your statement is objectively wrong. Could you not see a scenario where people would experiment on her? Behaviorly/psychologically?


No, nothing I said is objectively wrong. Regardless of whether I can see scenarios where people would experiment on her, my statement about worldwide protest and ethical standards is factual. And in any case "could you not see" is a call for a judgment; there's nothing objective about it, or elsewhere in your statement, which provides no support of any sort, let alone "objective" support, for your claim that my statement (which you don't even identify; I made more than one) is objectively wrong. And your subjective opinion that some statement of mine is wrong is not a valid basis for a downvote; I ask that you do not do that. In any case, I will not respond further.


Unfortunately, I did not downvote you. I was trying to guess why someone would downvote your comment.


Because it’s naive.

You think a 42,000 year old living human is just going to be left alone? There’s too much we can learn across a variety of subject matter to let that opportunity go to waste.


> Because it’s naive.

Such personal judgments are not valid reasons for a downvote.

> You think a 42,000 year old living human is just going to be left alone?

I said nothing of the sort. Of course she would not be left alone, any more than a mentally ill person who cannot function in society is left alone ... but we don't use them as guinea pigs. What I said was that performing experiments on her for the rest of her life would bring protests and would violate all sorts of ethical standards. It would be criminal, under current statutes.

> There’s too much we can learn across a variety of subject matter to let that opportunity go to waste.

A woman, even one 42,000 years old, is not merely an "opportunity", she's an autonomous person with human rights. But apparently the whole idea of the Enlightenment is naive.


> A woman, even one 42,000 years old, is not merely an "opportunity", she's an autonomous person with human rights. But apparently the whole idea of the Enlightenment is naive.

Nope. Her life effectively ended 42,000 years ago. Her unfreezing would basically be her afterlife.

Everything she ever knew would be dead and gone, the world would have completely changed. If we could figure out how she survived a 42,000 year freeze, it basically opens us up to interstellar space travel and expansion, even without FTL speeds. The benefits to humanity are far too great to pass them up for the selfish needs of a single individual, even if she cannot comprehend her important contribution to science.


> The benefits to humanity are far too great to pass them up for the selfish needs of a single individual, even if she cannot comprehend her important contribution to science.

It's remarkable that this is not a parody. Much (critical) has been written about this attitude, which led to the Tuskegee study and other atrocities. Again, what you are suggesting is criminal. I won't comment further.


I did the exact same thing, but tweeted about it* instead of saying it here.

https://mobile.twitter.com/doreen_michele/status/10226461705...


I guess you’ve kinda said it here as well ;)


Thats gotta be some optical illusion thing.


When you skim headlines instead of reading them, your brain makes guesses at the words instead of actually reading each letter, as a speed hack.

It's also used as a crutch when your eyesight slowly degrades over the years.

Sometimes it leads to Freudian slips, other times, you just expect to read about people instead of worms.


I think you're right -- "Worms frozen" looks like "Wo…en" when you read the two words quickly. Your brian tedns to flil in the mdidle of wodrs baesd on the ousitde lteters.




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